He couldn’t repeat as Canadian Open champion, but Jason might just have found something at a critical point of his season.
The Australian and world No.1, by his own admission, battled at Troon during the recent Open Championship and didn’t have his A-game early in Ontario this week.
And while a closing 67 at Glen Abbey today wasn’t enough to contend, his T14 finish and seven-under total was good enough to leave the Queenslander in a great frame of mind before heading to Baltusrol to defend his US PGA Championship trophy.
“I didn’t putt well this week,” Day said after posting his 10th top-20 finish of this US PGA Tour season.
“I think it was a combination of last week rolling into this week where you’ve got (greens running at) 9.5 on the stimp(meter) and you’re used to seeing one kind of line, and you come here and it’s anywhere (between) 12 and 13 and the line changes.”
“But it was a good confidence builder going into next week,” he said of his final round. “I feel good about my game.”
Another happy with his Sunday in Canada was Victorian Geoff Ogilvy who shot a closing 63, his lowest round since the same score at the 2009 Memorial.
Ogilvy, whose scores have probably belied the way he’s been playing lately, had missed 12 of 17 cuts this year before this week, but his rapid rise to nine under today even had him in the lead for almost three hours until the final groups swooped and Jhonattan Vegas eventually prevailed.
Ogilvy’s round included two eagles in his final three holes and moved him to 174th in the FedEx Cup standings.
“It was a great finish,” Ogilvy said.
“You don’t expect to eagle two of the last three holes, but you do expect to birdie two of the last three holes. It’s a bonus to make threes on those holes, but it’s nice to get up the right end of the leaderboard for once.”
Ogilvy explained this round was “great fun” and pointed to the calmer weather as part of the key to his success.
“Today was a little bit more docile,” he said. “The wind was a different direction, but it was overcast and softer.
“There’s a score out there, but yeah, to finish like that is dreamy.”
John Senden also closed with a 67 to finish T23 at six under, while Cameron Percy matched that score to finish at five under.
Rhein Gibson (-4), Stuart Appleby (-3), Robert Allenby (+1), Rod Pampling (+2) and Greg Chalmers (+3) also banked cheques.
Appleby fell short of keeping a full card at the end of his major medical exemption, but his recent good form was rewarded with conditional status meaning he’ll be eligible for the last three starts of the American season.